🏭 The Column: January 31, 2025

Good morning. Today we’re talking about two companies who are trying to crack ammonia in South Korea, LyondellBasell officially shutting down its refinery, and a new niacinamide plant being built in India.

Things Happened:

Syzygy and Lotte tried cracking ammonia

When I say “cracking ammonia”, I’m talking about splitting ammonia back into the hydrogen and nitrogen that it was made it from. This is a pretty weird thing to do, and the only reason it’s being explored is because hydrogen can’t be shipped overseas economically—but in theory, you could bond that hydrogen to nitrogen, ship the ammonia, and then split the ammonia upon arrival. Since the cost of producing green hydrogen is effectively proportional to the cost of electricity (since the only other inputs are water and capital), nations with ambitious hydrogen adoption goals and high energy costs (like South Korea, who insists on a hydrogen economy and currently imports 100% of their oil and gas) are interested in importing green hydrogen. Lotte is a South Korean petrochemical company, so it makes sense that they’d be exploring the feasibility of cracking ammonia with a startup. I have no idea how Syzygy’s process economics compare to traditional thermal cracking, but the press release certainly makes it sound promising. Right now I’m mostly just surprised that photocatalysis seems to be working at demonstration scale! [LINK]

LyondellBasell started closing its Houston refinery

After 107 years of operations, the refinery built by Sinclair Oil back in 1918 has seen the last of its days. The refinery has a fun history: ARCO took over the refinery (and Sinclair Oil’s Channelview complex) when they acquired Sinclair Oil in 1969, and then, in the late 1980s, ARCO combined its petrochemical assets to form a subsidiary called Lyondell Petrochemical before spinning it out as its own public company via IPO. Lyondell Petrochemical then sold a 41.25% stake in the refinery to Citgo in 1993, bought that stake back a decade later shortly before merging with Basell to form the company you know today. In any case, this announcement shouldn’t surprise you—they announced plans to shut down this refinery roughly 3 years ago after failing to find a buyer. Their tentative plan is to convert the site into a plastics recycling facility, but I don’t think it’s set in stone quite yet. [LINK]

A new niacinamide plant

Maybe you’ve heard of niacinamide, maybe you haven’t—but I guarantee you that everyone inside your nearest Sephora has. Niacinamide (aka vitamin B3) is one of the most in-demand skincare actives out there, showing up in everything from serums to moisturizers for its ability to smooth skin, reduce redness, and strengthen the skin barrier. We make about 40 KT of this stuff each year via the acid catalyzed hydrolysis of 3-cyanopyridine, which is made via the ammoxidation of 3-methylpyridine, which was made from commodities (acetaldehyde, formaldehyde, and ammonia). Lower purity grades end up in animal feed, and higher purity grades end up in pharmaceuticals and cosmetics. Demand for those high-purity grades is rising, so Jubilant is build a high-purity 5 KTA site in India and skipping the animal feed market. [LINK]

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Other Things Happened:

Ukrainian drones attacked Sibur’s petrochemical complex. The EU proposed tariffs on Russian and Belarusian fertilizers. Ube is putting an end to its nylon value chain. LKAB is building a phosphorus and rare earth elements plant in Sweden. Mattiq and Heraeus are trying to commercialize new electrocatalysts for green hydrogen production. A recent tax abatement application from ExxonMobil tells us that they’re considering building a new steam cracker in Texas. Brenntag expanded its caustic soda storage capacity in Canada. Dow Chemical is laying off 4% of its workforce and making other changes to reduce costs by $1bn. Lyondell’s HDPE process technology was selected for a new plant in Paradip, India.